About the Author
Cover: Chris Moore at Artist Partners
Michael Boatman spends his days and nights pretending to be other people. For a living. He’s acted in television shows; China Beach, Spin City, ARLI$$, Anger Management, Instant Mom,The Good Wife, films; Hamburger Hill, The Glass Shield, Bad Parents, and Broadway plays. After many years in his chosen profession he’s decided to chuck it all and seek his fortune as a writer. (Just kidding. He secretly dreams of changing the world as a talkative mime.)
Last God Standing Creator. Ruler. Stand-up Comic… When God decides to quit and join the human race to see what all the fuss is about, all hell breaks loose. Sensing his abdication, the other defunct gods of Earth’s vanquished pantheons want a piece of the action He abandoned. Meanwhile, the newly-humanized deity must discover the whereabouts and intentions of the similarly reincarnated Lucifer, and block the ascension of a murderous new God. How is he ever going to make it as a stand-up comedian with all of this going on…?
an excerpt from Last God Standing by Michael Boatman To be published April 2014 (everywhere – US/UK/RoW) in paperback and eBook formats. UK ISBN 978-0-85766-394-8 US ISBN 978-0-85766-395-5 EBOOK ISBN 978-0-85766-396-2
Angry Robot An imprint of Osprey Group Distributed in the US & Canada by Random House Distributed in the UK by Faber Factory Plus angryrobotbooks.com twitter.com/angryrobotbooks Copyright © Michael Boatman, 2014 All rights reserved. However, feel free to share this sample chapter with anyone you wish. You may post this on your blog too, if you can wrangle the (easy) code. And if you like this sample, buy the book.
PROLOGUE Chicago, 1986 AD Christmas on the Cooper Plantation. My parents are fighting again because Daddy burned the turkey and Mother’s working on her fourth vodka tonic. I’ve been counting her drinks while I play with the octopus from my new GI Joe Underwater Action set. Barbara always says smartass five year-olds should worry about other stuff than how many cocktails she’s had. She hates when I count, so of course I do it a lot. My brothers are fighting over their presents. Nobody’s paying attention when the stranger steps out of our Christmas tree. “Look at you,” the stranger says. “Odin told me you’d done it, but I didn’t believe him.” The stranger squats down and winks at me. “You sneaky little bastard.” The smiling stranger is skinny. He’s dressed funny, and he’s kind of wavy. He makes my eyes hurt. I should tell, but my brothers are screaming at each other and my parents are yelling for everyone to shut up. “Get that thing away from Lando before he chokes to death.” “For Christ’s sake, Barbara Jean, he’s perfectly safe.” The stranger laughs. No one pays him any attention. “Daddy’s wrong, you know. You’re not safe at all.” His eyes do something weird. Then my rubber octopus comes to life and wraps seven of its tentacles around my neck.
The other one slides into my mouth and slips down my throat. I can’t breathe. I can feel my father pounding on my back and yelling, “Let it go! Let it go, dammit!” Then everything gets dark. I wake up in a gray place, like a room made of smoke. I still can’t breathe but I can hear my parents fighting, a million miles away. “Goddammit, Herbert. You’ve killed him. On Christmas! I hope you’re happy.” Then a Golden Lady walks out of the dark. She’s shiny. She jingles when she walks and she looks like the ladies in the live Indian show we saw in Wisconsin last summer, only taller, a lot taller. And she’s shiny bright like the sun. Looking at her makes me want to laugh and cry all at the same time. “Not yet, buddy. Can’t have you upsetting the Plan.” Then she punches me in the stomach. I cough… “See you soon, old boy.” …and I’m staring up at my dad. He’s wearing wet chunks of rubber octopus tentacle all down his shirtfront. The smiling stranger is gone. Mother is over by the Christmas tree with the phone up to her ear. When she sees that I’m still alive, she slams the phone down. “Son of a bitch.” Summer, 1990 On a summer camp boat ride across Lake Michigan I decided to ask Angela Rhymer to be my girlfriend. We were nine years old that year, and I’d spent most of it staring at her. One day she told her big brother that I was stalking her. He beat me up. My mother met with the head camp counselor and said she’d castrate the next little sonofabitch who put his hands on me. I asked Angela, anyway. She said, “Maybe.” That was worse.
We were alone on the deck of the ferryboat. All the other campers and counselors had run inside because it was starting to rain. I grabbed Angela’s hand. I had to yell over the wind. “If I were Odysseus you’d be my Penelope!” “You’re weird,” she shouted. “And a little creepy.” Then the ferry lurched and a wave rolled over the side of the boat and washed me over the safety rail. I hit the water hard. I knew how to swim, but no matter how hard I tried to keep my head above the water it felt like something was dragging me down. I kicked and splashed and screamed. Then the something yanked me under and the lake closed over my head. Dark water swirls all around me, pushing me around, flipping me over. The water is changing, churning, until it becomes the face of a bearded old man with eyes like burning emeralds. There’s light in the water… lights shining in my eyes, as the glowing face pulls me in closer. It shifts and rolls like waves captured by strange gravity. I can see dozens of fish swimming inside the face. “You’ve made fools of us all. More and more of your believers abandon you every day… and you asked for it.” I’m drowning. My heart is pounding and my lungs are screaming and I have to breathe and I’m afraid to die. “Hey, fishface!” The face in the water turns toward the sound. That’s when I see her. The Golden Lady. She’s walking on the bottom of the Lake. She’s holding something in her hands, something silver that shines even brighter than the old manface. She’s smaller this time, darker, with different hair and she’s wearing a nurse’s uniform. But she’s still the Golden Lady. And she’s come for me. “Poseidon. You’re pathetic.” The light in her hands goes nuclear bright, and suddenly I can breathe. I’m lying on the rocky bottom with all that water rolling above me but, somehow, the Golden Lady’s silver light
protects me. Through the ceiling of black water, I can see the face looking down at us. It looks totally pissed. “Foul! Foul! Traitorous squaw!” “Begone, thou racist remnant! Go haunt an oil rig!” The face in the water, Poseidon, screams, and burns in the silver light from the object in the Golden Lady’s hands. Then it’s gone. “Are you alright?” When I wake up, I’m lying on the deck with rain hitting my face. The Golden Lady nods. Then she puts the shining thing in the small purse on her hip and the silver light goes out. I can hear people yelling on the other side of the ferry. I can hear Angela crying. But all I can see is the Golden Lady’s face. Her eyes. “Do I… do I know you?” “Not yet,” she laughs. “You will know me. But not yet.” “What is that silver thing? Can I see it?” “That would be very bad.” “Why?” “Never mind. You won’t remember any of this when I’m gone.” “I won’t?” “Nope.” “OK.” Someone, my camp counselor, screams my name. People are running toward us. “Lando! I found him! He’s over here!” But the strange nurse and her silver purse are gone. The Knock Knock Club. Peoria Illinois. 2003 3am and my set killed. It was a full house; a great crowd full of happy drunks. Afterward, feeling victorious and lonely, I bought all the other comics a round. By midnight I was way too drunk to drive.
Screw it. It’s your birthday. I’m trying to shove my inhaler into the ignition slot when she appears. No special effects this time. She is simply… there, sitting next to me in the passenger seat. This time, she wears the face of a Cherokee matriarch; regal bearing, long gray hair loose and flowing over strong, straight shoulders. She’s wearing a velvety black cloak made from… made from… “Thunderbird feathers,” she says, as if she’d read my mind. “I did read your mind. Why do you keep flinching?” “Cause every time you show up something tries to kill me.” The Golden Lady laughs. “I know the feeling.” “Who are you, lady? Why do I know you?” “That’s a long story, Lando Cooper. But I’m afraid you’re in no condition to hear it.” “Are you my guardian angel?” “Eewww. Gross.” “What’s your name, Golden Lady? Pretty Indian Lady with the long pretty hair.” “I’ve had many names. The gods of the Navajo nation called me Changing Woman. For now, you can call me… Constant.” “Constance?” “Constant.” “Well, Constance, today is my birthday.” “Of course. A very special birthday.” “Thass right, Connie. For today I am a man.” “And just look at you. Your parents must be so proud.” The unexpected gravity of that statement stalls my tongue and I have to look away before I embarrass myself. “They never understood me.” “Oh boy. Look, we’ve got so much work to do I don’t even want to think about it. It’s time to go.” “Where exactly are we going, my Connie?” “To school, my bumbling mortal idiot.”
“Hey, lady… I happen to be the possessor of a Bachelors degree from one of our nation’s finest educational institutions. I done made the grade.” I try to start the car with my inhaler again and throw up all over the steering wheel instead. “Oh boy.” Then Constant is holding the thing I’ve turned over in my memory since that day on the ferry. She holds it so that I can see it plainly: it’s a seashell. A shining seashell. She raises it, bathing my face with silver radiance. And I am suddenly stonecold sober. “I know this. This is… this is…” “Yes. It is.” I was twenty-two years old and completely unprepared for what came next. It was the first day of the rest of my mortal life. Like most people, I thought I was special enough to handle whatever destiny the Golden Lady represented. I was wrong.
CHAPTER I
DUEL I should be happy. After two thousand years spent doing the job I was created to do, I deserve a little happiness. If only there was someone I could complain to; a clergyman or union representative. But there isn’t. And even though that’s mostly my fault, it still sucks. See, thirty seconds ago the saleswoman lost twenty pounds and started speaking French. That means a lot of people are about to die: there’s a god waiting outside this jewelry store and he wants to kill me. “Your fiancée will be so happy, Monsieur Cooper,” the saleswoman says. Then her polite professional demeanor evaporates, replaced by the confusion I’ve come to know all too well. “I’m thin! And I’m speaking French!” “Yes.” “But I don’t speak French.” I stuff the little gold-wrapped box into my front pocket. I’ve worked my butt off to be able to buy that ring and, angry god or no angry god, it’s coming with me. “In another life, your father accepted that job at Banque Populaire and moved your family to Paris. You grew up there.” “But Daddy didn’t take that job. They were getting a divorce and… Wait… how did you know that?” Outside, someone calls me by my professional name.
“Yahweh! Come out and face me!” The voice is loud, supernaturally powerful, and familiar. “Mon dieu… what’s happening?” The saleswoman is getting more French by the nanosecond. I can’t help but pity her – she doesn’t know she’s about to die. If she did she wouldn’t have worn that dress. “I’m French! I love zis life!” “Don’t get used to it.” I step into the sunlight basting Michigan Avenue. Chicago is in the last throes of a vicious midsummer heatwave, but my immortal enemy stands just up ahead, all puffed up like he’s still got the whole world in his hands. “Well, well, well. How far the mighty has fallen.” Typical. Retired for two thousand years and the thick Greek lummox still hasn’t mastered English. “Hey, Yahweh! I’m talkin’ to you!” “We’re too old for this, Zeus.” I cut a wide swath around the barrel-chested lunatic, focusing on my lime green Sketchers as they slap the pavement. Just keep walking, Lando. Hey! Check out that pile of dog turds. Much more interesting than the lummox. “You hear what I say, desert dog? I’m going to keeek your ass! You and your faggoty son!” Hello. I’m a real boy. This is not my problem. I’ve struggled with anger issues. I won’t go into detail – just read the Old Testament and you’ll get the picture. But thoughts of the future help to keep me calm. I’ve sacrificed everything to be here. Literally. I can do this. I’m five yards from the elevated train entrance; fifteen feet from the comforting embrace of other Chicagoans and their everyday human problems when a thunderclap shatters store windows up and down Michigan Avenue. Then a Voice thunders overhead.
“Face me, Yahweh! Or I’ll burn this city to the ground!” Damn. The howling maniac is six and a half feet tall and built like a man-shaped oak tree. He stands there, flexing his Mediterranean muscles in the middle of Michigan Avenue. Clearly the King of the Greek Gods is determined to make ignoring him difficult. The lightning bolt that blasts the concrete beneath my feet makes it impossible: I jump backward, narrowly avoiding electrocution. The skies over the Loop go black. The wind off Lake Michigan whips itself into a fury, howling through steel and stone canyons: Zeus must have bullied one of his bastard elemental offspring into harassing me. His third bolt strikes a group of Swedish tourists getting off a double decker tour bus parked in front of the jewelry store. The tour bus explodes. The jewelry store goes up in a tremendous ball of smoke and flame. The shockwave knocks me off my feet as a peal of hypersound like the silent bellow of a newborn sun rings out over the city, the air clanging with the shriek of unauthorized Creation: the birthscreams of diverging realities. A few yards away, a woman in a tight green dress lying in a shattered Best Buy window display staggers to her feet. Well, part of her staggers to her feet: she’s technically dead but her soul has nowhere to go, not with all this celestial interference clogging the ethers. The woman in the green (and red) dress is staggering around, deceased and utterly confused. Her legs are long and well-formed: a dancer’s legs. The leggy dead dancer lurches toward a young mother grasping a stroller. The young mother gapes as the dead hottie bumps into the stroller, spilling the toddler inside it out onto the sidewalk. The toddler bounces off the curb and rolls into oncoming traffic. Fortunately, the spectacle Zeus is creating has stalled traffic on both sides of Michigan Avenue.
The dead hottie staggers toward the toddler. The young mother bolts past the burning tour bus, jumps off the curb and onto the dead hottie’s back, the two of them twirling around in the Buses Only lane; a shrieking blonde motherbear driven insane by a rapidfire intrusion of the Weird, catfighting with the hot dead dancer while a thousand terrified onlookers look on. “Hey, douchebag,” a Voice says from everywhere. “Are you ready to parlay now?” Parlay. Damn, how I hate the Greeks. Amid a chorus of screams from the panicking mortals around us, Zeus assumes an Aspect and rises toward the sky. Lightning flashes from his eyes, crackles from the ends of his hair. And he’s naked. Looks like someone has been hoarding his divine energies: His godly member extends the length of a steel girder. “What do you want, Zeus?” “I want your head, God of the Hebrews!” Behind him, the John Hancock Center shudders and bursts into flames. More screams. A taxi driver on the far side of the burning bus tries to move his car and smashes into the Prius in front of him. The Prius’ owner jumps out of his car, swearing in Farsi. He reaches in through the cab’s window, pulls the driver out and begins to pummel him. Fights are breaking out all along Michigan Avenue. Several dozen onlookers attack themselves, punching and tearing their own faces. An attractive African-American female police officer near the epicenter of the disturbance, gets out of her stalled patrol car and stares, openmouthed, at Zeus. Then she breaks into applause. “It’s the End of Days! Finally!” The police officer grabs a passing Sikh schoolboy by the straps of his backpack and tries to pull off his turban. The Sikh schoolboy breaks free and sprints away. The policewoman shoots him.
I’m going to have a headache for the next month. A great rushing wind answers my command: a certain theatricality is called for in every godfight. Fortunately, I come from a family that knows how to stage a confrontation. “Let me get this straight, Zeus. You would contradict the Eshuum? You would breach the terms of your surrender?” Back in the Buses Only lane, dead hottie is bouncing blonde mom’s head off a convenient fire hydrant. The toddler laughs and claps his hands to the rhythm of his mother’s bludgeoning: Bonk. Bonk. Bonk. Then he vomits a swarm of locusts. Zeus raises his right fist, his forearm tendons flexing like angry anacondas, reaches heavenward and clenches lightning from the screaming sky. “I would dare the Fates themselves to see you dead, usurper! Befouler of the faithful! Comedian!” “You’re one to talk, Nymph fondler!” Thunder tears the air like the roar of a thousand badly castrated bull elephants. Behind me, the Sears Tower flickers and vanishes, only to reappear, flicker and vanish again. In its place appears a mammoth golden retriever as big as a cathedral. His name is Cheezy Domino. Zeus hammers me with lightning, smites me with hailstones and lashes me with hurricane force winds. It hurts, especially the smiting part. But the cost to his divine energy reserves should debilitate even a god of his stature: I can’t help wondering where he’s getting the extra power. Focus, Cooper. He’s immortal. You’re not. I reach into the Eshuum and pull out an offensive Aspect of my own: He Who Judges, the stonefaced God who opened up a can of divine whup-ass on Sodom and Gomorrah, shrugs his way out of my mind and into reality, which makes sense, considering that Zeus’ drunken killing binge qualifies as an abomination of post-biblical proportions. Maybe he’ll learn to appreciate prolonged sobriety after a few millennia as a
burning pillar of salt. “Enough!” Zeus either doesn’t know or doesn’t care about the damage a godfight can cause to the fabric of human consciousness; what we of the divine orders call the Eshuum. I have to stop this breaching before he plunges the world into Chaos. “Attend me, Yahweh! Cast off thy mortal seeming and take to the skies! Fly with me into the heat of the sun that we may learn who is the true King of Creation!” He’s nearly five stories tall by now. His image must be whipping around the planet, recorded by thousands of mobile phones, playing hob around the internet… Oy, the headache… “Fight me, God of sheep and pestilence! You cower before me because you dare not… burrrrrrroppt…!” Zeus’s declaration fills the air with the sickly sweet stench of downmarket ambrosia and Schlitz Malt Liquor. The son of Cronus is drunk, (no surprise there really, since he’s Greek too), but how to deal with him? A banishment? A temporary damnation? But to whose Hell? Cheezy Domino lifts his leg and wees all over downtown Chicago. The warm river of giant dog urine flushes a bus-load of confused retirees down the street, around the corner and out of sight. The stink snaps me back to my senses. My human perceptions reassert themselves... I reeled in my psychic extrusions and recalled He Who Judges. “No!” HWJ howled. “Let me broil the titanspawn in a cataclysm of brimstone! I will baste his heathen flesh in rivers of righteous hellfire!” But I needed a way to diffuse the situation, not make it worse. I had to divest Zeus of the excess power he was burning and minimize the damage to the Eshuum. I needed a plan; something fast and dirty and cosmically low impact. I shoved He Who Judges back into the holding pen in my
brain as Zeus blasted the Merchandise Mart with a volley of thunderbolts. The attack sent hundreds of screaming mortals flooding into the streets: it was only a matter of time before he started ravishing people. “You were always a showoff, Zeus. Lightning bolts… earthquakes… and for what? Empty gestures. They’re totally passé.” “Fool! I am Zeus Aegiduchos! Skyfather and Stormlord! Cloud Snorter and Hymen Smasher! The thunder speaks with my voice! The lightning is my spear! My essence mingles with the Four Winds and sows my seed upon the lips of a million whores!” “Come on, Zee. Even with all this power you’re wasting, you’re still totally assboned.” Zeus frowned down at me, storms raging in his eyes. “‘Assboned’?” “Hello? Are you deaf and irrelevant?” All gods hate being talked down to: Zeus once changed an innocent nymph into a swan merely for avoiding his attempts to rape her. Now I hoped to goad him into overreaching again. “‘The thunder is my voice! The lightning is my spear?’ Zdog… that stuff is older than Methuselah. Literally. Even worse... it’s corny.” “‘Corny’?” “Like Kansas. Why do you think millions of mortals rejected you?” Zeus’ eyes dimmed. He shook his head like a wounded bear beset by saltfooted flies. Then he roared, “I AM NOT IRRELEVANT! I AM THE COMING!” I was trying to make sense of that statement when the street beneath my feet buckled. From somewhere nearby, a thousand mortals screamed as the Butkus Bank Building collapsed. The invisible effluvia of hundreds of prayers rose up around me like a silent symphony of pain only to vanish
in a Hellenic heartbeat: Zeus had just extinguished another thousand mortal lives. Talk faster, Cooper. “Yo,” I shrugged. “I had my fingers on the pulse, baby, the zeitgeist.” “Zeitgeist?” Zeus rumbled. “That’s… French?” The air was filled with screaming. And buoyed upon nearly every scream, a flotilla of prayers, whispering like wind across the sands of a distant desert. Help me, Lord! Save me, Allah. Where are you? I had to speed things up: any one of these prayers, if answered under these circumstances, would spell cosmic disaster. “You’ve got plenty of juice, Zeus. But I’ll bet you haven’t read a book in, what? Five thousand years?” Another lightning bolt, this one close enough to fry my eyebrows. Ozone stung my nostrils. I put myself out. “I’ll read the tale of your destruction in your sizzling entrails, Dog of the Desert! I’ll thumb through your King James claptrap while I bang your feeble corpse!” “You were Top Dog, Zeus; Immortal god among gods. But how did you spend your divinity? Turning yourself into showers of golden coins and impregnating cows. Major douche move. That’s why my followers were able to supplant yours: I was dialed in, Zed.” The winds dwindled as Zeus’ divine focus shifted from smiting to doubting. The lightning storm lost some of its fury: Zeus began to subside. “What’s this ‘dialed in’? Why do you talk like that?” He shook his head, sending swarms of motivated electrons swirling skyward. But he had shrunk to the height of a modest bungalow: it was now or never.
“I guess that’s why I still have a few believers, Zeus. Granted… nobody’s sacrificing their children to me anymore, except for two or three churches in West Texas, but at least I’m still connected.” “Connected?” “Sure. But you and your peeps are all sizzle and no souvlaki; you’re a gyro made from million-day-old toga meat; cosmic hayseeds with baklava where your style sense should be. You’re like the closing credits at the end of the last feature at the Midnight Bargain Matinopolis: ie, nobody ‘grocks’ the Greek Gods anymore.” “Dialed in?” Zeus repeated, his voice shaky with perfectly mortal confusion. He was nearly human-sized when I met him in the middle of Michigan Avenue. “I don’t understand anything you say.” I leaned forward to make certain Zeus could hear me. He leaned forward, all traces of his Aspect extinguished, barely a flicker of lightning in his hair; eager to hear the secret wisdom of the God of the Burning Bush. Then I kicked him in the nuts. Zeus howled, and fell to the sidewalk, clutching his divine scrotum. “While you lie there trying to change into something with no testicles, I’m going to draw you down. It’s going to hurt you, Zeus, a lot more than it will me. And it hurts me. A lot.” I closed my eyes and pinpointed Zeus’ divine lifeforce. To my upgraded perceptions he shone like a man-shaped star; far too much power than even he should have been able to wield under current planetary belief conditions. What have you been doing, Zeus? I stretched forth my hand. Lightning burst from Zeus’ body, the shafts crackling from him, dancing along my fingers to fill my senses with their alien tang. No doubt about it: Zeus had been dipping his fingers into some cosmically strange cookie jars.
The Greek alpha god writhed on the ruptured sidewalk, momentarily held captive by my will, his perfect teeth gnashing the air in silent protest of his impending banishment. His storm-gray eyes rolled in their sockets and found mine and his wounded scowl broadened into a grimace of… fear? “Beware, Yahweh. The Coming stalks us all.” Then those strange energies flared up from Zeus and blinded my mortal eyes for a moment. Somewhere in the midst of that conflagration, Zeus screamed. The shockwave was subtle as the deathshriek of a burning Babylonian. I staggered backward, half blinded, covering my ears against that awful roar. It was all so distracting that it took me a moment to realise that Zeus was gone. He should have been under my control, unable to go anyplace to which I hadn’t banished him. But the sidewalk was empty, a vaguely Zeus-shaped scorch mark the only evidence he’d ever been there. But where was his power? Other than those first few wisps I’d absorbed, the Eshuum was pinpricked in several places but essentially undamaged by that bruising of strange force. What’s happening? Using the wisps of divinity I’d scarfed from Zeus, I quieted the thunder, and shoved the unused lightning into a pocket dimension I kept handy for such occasions. I scanned the ether for some sign of the vanished Skyfather, but he was gone, really gone; erased as if he had never existed. I could still taste the psychic spoor of the Egyptian Pantheon long after Moses took the Hebrews out of Egypt. Zeus’s energies should have flowed into me, but they hadn’t. And Zeus was… gone. Everyone was screaming. Humans were fighting in the streets, driven mad by the Chaos energies our godfight had unleashed. Downtown Chicago looked like someone detonated an atom bomb under Oprah’s townhouse. In the
Buses Only lane, the dead dancer was trying to stuff the newly orphaned toddler down an open manhole. The toddler was putting up a good fight but losing strength with every shove. Over by the Lake, Cheesy Domino was humping the Art Institute of Chicago: if I was going to prevent a catastrophic rupture I needed to get crackalackin’. I spoke a Word, a shrieking shard of matter-rearranging verbiage. You might call it the access code to the operating system of the gods. And Everything changed. Five minutes later… I was walking toward the L train. I was twenty minutes past the end of my lunch break, my boss was blowing up my mobile phone, and I was nursing the onset of what was going to be the biggest migraine in the history of grain. But I’d set everything aright: a relatively simple procedure when you can control the flow of the Eshuum. Not so simple when saddled with a human brain. I’d rolled back Time to a few moments before Zeus attacked me and removed our duel from the spacetime continuum. No fuzzy photos of the confrontation would haunt the nightly news or go viral on the internet; no evidence to alert humanity to the presence of its faded gods. In effect: the Michigan Avenue godfight never happened. The tour bus trundled on its way, filled with laughing, living Swedes. The attractive woman with her great legs and green dress pranced by without even glancing my way. Hmmmph. If she remembered her original timeline she’d have fallen to her knees and kissed my hightops: dead one moment/healthy with both eyes free of footlong glass shards the next. I’d cleaned up the Mercedes-sized droppings left by Cheezy Domino and sent him back to his home dimension: he was adorable but his presence in my dimension was an abomination.
I’d brought back the Sears Tower: no one noticed. The only person who acknowledged my efforts was the orphaned toddler. As I resurrected his mother and placed him back in his stroller, he’d asked if I could sweeten his mommy’s breast milk. According to him it tasted like mucous. I’d granted his wish because… well, who needs snotty breast milk? With the mortal world turning once more as it should, I boarded the elevated train and headed back to work. Ten minutes later, the headache I’d anticipated was coming on with a vengeance. I leaned my forehead against the cool window next to my seat and watched the blue vastness of Lake Michigan as I turned over the last hour’s events. Something weird was happening, something that had never happened across the long slog of Creation: a major god, the All-Father of one of the world’s last great pantheons, had been erased. Murdered? I was haunted by the song of the strange energies as they engulfed Zeus at the end. The taste of their effluence still stung the back of my throat. Suddenly I had a mystery on my hands and I didn’t like it one bit. But I was going to have to investigate. After all, it’s my area. I’m the last of the old guard, at least as far as I can see, the semi-retired captain of a losing team crewed by humanity’s outgrown gods. Now I had a haunting absence; a hole where a god should have been but wasn’t. Zeus was gone, and if the power that should have been released from his renunciation had not flowed into me… where was it? Beware. The Coming stalks us all. And who or what was “the Coming”? I was unfamiliar with such an entity. And I knew everybody. I grabbed my inhaler and took a quick suck. Then, while my enflamed bronchi settled down, I leaned back against the seat and tried to relax. I needed answers like I needed Tylenol
with a whiskey chaser. But Tylenol makes me nauseous, and getting drunk was the most irresponsible thing I could do. I had to keep my wits about me. Beware. The Coming stalks us all. I usually ignore prophesy. After all, my former self had initially warned Noah about my plan to punish humankind by turning every firstborn mortal child into a particularly unpleasant specimen of cuttlefish. It was only after Noah reminded me that that many angry aquatic invertebrates would need a lot more water in order to survive long enough to repent of their sins that I came up with the idea for a great flood. By the time I got around to confirming the change with Noah, half the human race had drowned. I knew how unreliable divine warnings can be. But I couldn’t shake the sense of foreboding that Zeus’ warning had cast: trouble was rushing toward me like a plague of blackwinged sorrows. I had a feeling there was going to be Hell to pay.
CHAPTER II
I AM User Name: Yahweh. Screen Name: JVH Title: God of the Israelites. The Creator. “The Man Upstairs.” Occupation: I’m the current Guardian of Eschatological Continuity for Human Consciousness and Development. I’m also the Dominant Defender of Dimensional Integrity Against ODAE (Obsolescent Divine Aggression and Encroachment). Standup Comic. Turn Ons: Thought. Music. Creativity. The Arts and Sciences. Classic Comic Books. Turn Offs: Negativity. Conservative Talk Radio. TV: Fawlty Towers. The Daily Show. Doctor Who. The Science Channel. Food Network. Music: Suzanne Vega. Ella Fitzgerald. Bossocucanova. James Brown. Tokyo Rocketbike Cyberninja Team Tetsuo! Contact email: yahwent@Skyfathergroup.Waring.DEUS God’s Facebook Page The morning after the fight with Zeus reminded me that having a human body is fun when it comes to things like Chicago-style deep dish pizza or drunken orgies. But you try experiencing a million “morning afters” while still recovering from your own hangover. Now multiply that by a few hundred
times a million; all those praying people swearing they’ll never overeat/drink/smoke crack/seduce perfect strangers ever again, and you’ll begin to get an idea of the festival that is my day-to-day existence. And, sometime during the duel with Zeus, I picked up a vicious case of the crabs. “Damn Greeks.” “Lando! Your hippie friend is stinking up the living room!” Barbara never used my buddies’ names, pretending she couldn’t quite remember them, and wouldn’t bother trying since they wouldn’t be coming around much after she’d informed me about how horrible they really were. Not that I had many buddies. In fact, I had exactly one: the fellow who was basting her favorite sofa in a cloud of patchouli oil and vegan beef jerky. “Coming!” Just then my phone lit up where it lay on my bedside night table; an electronic remix of Agnus Dei. Call from Surabhi “Whaddup?” “Hello, Loverman. Bad news about tonight I’m afraid.” Surabhi’s voice was the charming mix of accents typical of second generation London-bred Afro-Brits who immigrate to the American Midwest. “What’s wrong?” I took a deep breath: I sounded desperate. And even though I was desperate I didn’t have to sound like it. “I promised to cover for one of the other teachers at the Language Center. She just went into labor. Fifty students. I can’t cancel on them.” “But I’ve got tickets to Namaste, Brahma Blumberg at the Biolark.” “Sorry, babe. Ask your homeboy, Yuri. Maybe he’ll go with you.” “But you’re going to New York tomorrow.”
“I’ll be back Friday. I promise I’ll make it up to you then. Crap… I’ve gotta get back to work. I love you, Lando Cooper.” “Love you too.” We disconnected. I bent to grab my knapsack, went lightheaded and nearly fell on my face. I took some deep breaths until the dizziness passed. Then I faced myself in the full length mirror on the door that led to my bathroom. “Yahweh of the Israelites, you are gettin’ hitched come hell or high water.” One night, years earlier, I’d gotten drunk and tried to improve my appearance. I lost control of the power and turned myself into an embryonic blue whale. It had taken me two hours to change back, another twenty minutes to repair the floor, and another two weeks to clean up all that afterbirth. My mortal body was just below average height, thin yet cursed with a jiggly ring of baby fat around my midsection which, at the biological age of twenty-nine, was maddening enough to make me consider re-reincarnating myself with a lower BMI. My hair was my best feature: a decent sized afro that I labored not to maintain on a daily basis. Other than a persistent itching in my nether regions, that was it. I worked out four days a week in the basement with my father’s old gym equipment: push-ups, sit-ups, “medicine hurls” and other “old school” calisthenics calculated to rupture me when I most expected it. In an attempt to rebuild me into the kind of man of which he could be proud, Herb insisted on murdering me: character building through physical suffering. I flexed both biceps: string cheese had better tone. Why not just give yourself a little boost? Just move a few proteins around; bump up your hormonal output. It’s not like anyone’s watching. You could be an Adonis. “No.” I was determined to look at the life I had given me as a gift: billions of people in the world had to make do with less.
I took a hit from my inhaler and coughed: recently my “childhood” asthma had set its sights on my adulthood. As the pressure on my chest lessened, my other burden made itself felt. “Lando Calrissian Darnell Cooper, don’t make me come up there!” Jesus. Some people name their offspring after their favorite doctor or beloved religious icon. My mortal father named me with his favorite actor in mind. “Mister Billy Dee Williams, dammit.” I can still remember my mortal parents arguing about it only hours after I was Embodied. “Billy Dee sounds like a pimp’s name, Herbert. Do you really want to name your son after a pimp?” My father was trying to figure out a way to smoke in a hospital maternity ward. At that time Herb dearly loved smoking. He once claimed he could read the stock market in piles of flicked ashes the way African griots read flung chicken bones. “Woman, I keep telling you: Billy Dee Williams is the greatest actor of our generation. ‘Billy Dee Cooper.’ It has a special kind of music.” “It’s music to whip whores by.” “I defy anyone to watch The Empire Strikes Back and not be emotionally affected.” “You are not naming any son of mine after a pimp!” Barbara would look harshly on the Star Wars franchise in later years, but Herb remained a devoted fan of Empire and Return of the Jedi, largely because of Billy Dee Williams’ performance as “Lando Calrissian”. Darnell was my mother’s dead father’s name so that was a no-brainer. Since they both agreed that “Lando Calrissian Darnell” sounded powerful without being too “ghetto”, they settled on all three. “Lando Calrissian Darnell Cooper.”
I remember wondering, as awareness of my former godhood faded, how much divinity it would take to crawl back up my mother’s fallopian tubes and pretend the whole thing never happened. As the Coopers cooed and snickered at me, I lay there, awash in my own meconium, unable to express the horror unfolding in my postnatal gut. And as my divine candle flickered out, I understood that this was to be only the first step down a long, ugly road with humiliation as my most frequent companion. “Coming!” I checked my hair, squeezed a pimple that had teleported onto the end of my nose, picked my afro till I struck sparks, then hurried downstairs. My agent hated to be kept waiting. “What took you so long? My pitch meeting’s in less than an hour and if I’m late Corroder will fry my balls for lunch.” “Sorry,” I mumbled through a mouthful of Granola. “Migraine. I’m pretty sure a vicious pixie took a dump in my head last night.” “Dude,” Yuri growled. “I’m late and you’re talking about pixies. You plan on growing up anytime soon? Jesus.” He snatched up his Blackberry and sent his thumbs flying over the keypad. “I’m texting Corroder to tell him we’re stuck in traffic.” “I’ll be ready in ten seconds. Why lie?” Yuri glared at me with an expression that managed to convey pity and exasperation simultaneously. “When are you gonna get a haircut? Afros are so 2000.” “My hair is a political statement.” “Right: ‘I don’t know how to groom myself. Please kill me.’” “That’s a little dark.” “Dude… I’m a cable television executive and I can’t pay my cable bill. ‘Dark’ is what I do.”
Yuriel Kalashnikov was handsome in a California beach bum sort of way; muscular without being obnoxious about it, with dirty-blond hair and electric blue eyes; a young Clint Eastwood armed with a Blackberry instead of a Colt 45. He was born of a handsome Swedish immigrant couple from San Francisco’s “Little Trollhattan” neighborhood: Ulrik and Ingeborg Rolfstaddtsen. Ulrik was an independently wealthy organic beet farmer and yoga instructor. Ingeborg was a vegan animal rights activist/ecoterrorist/singersongwriter. They met in 1974 during a street festival dedicated to ending the war in Korea despite the fact that it officially ended in 1953. Ulrik, however, had uncovered evidence while astral projecting, that the American Military Industrial Complex was waging a covert, CIA-funded police action in Pyongyang. While attending a seminar on how to empower the little-known but highly-endangered Native American coon rat, Ulrik watched Ingeborg sing the song that would make her a minor national sensation: Coon Rat vs Fat Cat. The song scurried halfway up the Top 40 pop charts before relegating itself to the 99 cent music rack of history. Yuriel Kalasknikov Che Guevara Rolfstaddtsen was born eleven months later. Now, the leftist socialist Yuri, a bisexual yoga devotee who belonged to PETA, Greenpeace, ACTUP, MOVEON.ORG and the NAACP; who was a subscribing member to National Public Radio, The Daily Anarchist and Oprah’s Book Club… Yuri Kalashnikov was the angriest pacifist on Earth. We’d met one night five years earlier at a comedy club on the North Side. He was there representing a client, a terrible Indian comic with a wooden leg. He’d watched my set and declared himself a fan. He represented me for three months before being offered a job as an assistant to a television development executive. We’d remained friends and occasional collaborators ever since.
“Can we go please? I can’t be late because of you. Again.” I grabbed my satchel and headed toward the front door. “Wait one. Goddamn. Minute.” My mother stepped out of the kitchen. Barbara Cooper was tall, light brown; the “high yellow” to my father’s “milk chocolate”. She was wearing an ultratight, leopard print microdress that might have contained her in the Eighties but had long since given up the fight. She was the kind of “thin” that never translated into “fit”, her breasts as dangly as the udders on an undermilked heifer. For some reason, she’d chosen that morning to show off the network of fine scars from her latest unsuccessful varicose vein removal surgery. She was wearing her favorite pink “chacha heels”, the ones she only broke out when she was trying to seduce one of my friends. She took a drag off her Virgina Slim and French inhaled. “Aren’t you boys going to compliment a lady on her appearance?” “Barbara,” I said. “Why are you dressed that way?” “I’m on a voyage of self discovery.” “You hoping to discover the Island of Sad Old Hookers?” Barbara blew a perfect menthol smoke ring across the living room. “I’m trying to ‘discover’ why you haven’t introduced me to your handsome friend.” “It’s Yuri, Barbara. You’ve only met him a hundred times.” “Sarcasm makes you look ignorant, dear.” “Herb quit smoking, you know. He’s healthier than you are. Doesn’t that fill you with rage?” Barbara laughed while her eyes checked out Yuri’s package. “Some of your darker skinned blacks look ridiculous with cigarettes dangling between their big, Ubangi soup coolers, Lando. You know that. Mama can pull it off because I’m one of the sexy people. Right, Yuri?” Barbara batted her eyes and shook her “junk” in a way that made it nearly impossible to look at her without screaming.
“Yuri… what is that? Polish?” “No, ma’am. It’s Russian.” “You mean my boring son is hanging out with a communist? How’s that for a poke in the shitbox?” “Mother! You’re ‘thinking out loud’ again.” Barbara shrugged this away. “I’m sorry, Yuri. I’m sure Lando has told you about my condition.” “Yes, ma’am. It’s not a problem, Barb.” Barbara giggled. The vodka gust scorched the air between her mouth and my nostrils. “He’s a winner, Lando. And so handsome...” Yuri offered up his most rakish smile. “Coming from a looker like you, I’ll take that as high praise, Barbara.” “…for a big dumb Polack.” “Barbara!” “You gentlemen still haven’t commented on my appearance.” “That’s because you look ridiculous.” Barbara dropped her cigarette and ground it out on the carpet. Then loosened her straps and winked at me. “Good.” “Look out!” Yuri wrenched the wheel sharply to the left, swerving into the far lane to avoid the elderly man who had just stepped out of his ancient white Cadillac. We’d never even come close to hitting him, but we nearly rear-ended the biker on the Harley stopped at the red light in front of us. We screeched to a halt inches from the Harley’s rear wheel. Yuri overreacted. Of course. “Will you stop doing that?” “I wasn’t sure you saw him.” We were log-jammed in downtown rushhour traffic. In the sweltering heat inside his beloved second generation electric car, Yuri started doing his deep breathing exercises.
“Barbara’s been acting very strange lately.” “‘Strange’ for your family or ‘strange’ for normal people?” “What’s wrong with you?” “Sorry. I’m pitching something to Corroder today and I’m nervous. I think it could be really big.” “Swell. What is it?” “I woke up with this idea in the middle of the night. It was so powerful I started developing it right then and there…” “Here’s my stop. Stop now!” Yuri jammed on the brakes, throwing me against the dashboard. I bounced. Then I grabbed my backpack and opened the door. “You up for a movie tonight?” Surabhi’s got to work, and I’ve got two tickets to see Namaste, Brahma Blumberg at the Biolark.” “I hate when you do that.” “What?” “Ask me what I’m up to and then change the subject before I can answer. Besides being the worst backseat driver on Earth, you’re also incredibly self-centered.” “No I’m not.” “You make everything about you.” Yuri shrugged, and lit a cigarette from the box he’d recently begun keeping in his glove compartment. “Sometimes it’s hard to be your friend. I’m just sayin’.” “Hurtful. Come on, hang out with me tonight.” “Negative. Corroder and I have a dinner meeting with the Vice President of Comedy Development at Fox. He’s in Chicago looking to scare up some talent.” “OK, meanwhile, I’ve got the gig at Coconut Jose’s on Thursday; a proposal dinner to plan for Friday night; and my parents are about to kill each other and take a Korean callgirl with them.” “You’re gonna kill at Coconut Jose’s. This is going to be a big gig for you. I can feel it.” Yuri glanced at his Greenpeace
Whale Watch. “Damn. I gotta jet. You want me to pick you up Thursday night?” “No thanks. I finally got a monthly bus pass. You’re a carpool-free agent, my friend.” “Bus pass? One of these days you’ll work up the balls to actually drive a car.” “I prefer public transportation. Why add to the black cloud of toxins already hanging over our fair city?” “Dude,” Yuri sneered through the passenger’s window. “When the Hell are you going to stop fooling yourself?”
CHAPTER III
THE ELEPHANT WAS DOUBLE BOOKED “Livin’ on borrowed time.” (Response to the question, “What are you doing?”) God’s Twitter Page In the twenty years he’d owned and operated Cooper & Sons Auto Supply, Herb Cooper had skydived on camera while playing an accordion, and waterskied across the Chicago River towed by a speedboat covered with tastefully nude pictures of himself. Once, he attempted to ride a bull in front of a screaming crowd during a rodeo at the United Center. He’d actually stayed on for four seconds before the bull, a bovine killing machine named Assassin, bucked him off and nearly trampled him to death while he screamed at the camera crew to “…keep rolling! No matter what!” The bull hurled Herb over the retaining fence. He landed in the lap of the Governor of Illinois. From his hospital bed Herb convinced local stations to run the footage the next day, complete with a sped up rendition of Dueling Banjos playing underneath. The stunt cost him a broken leg, three cracked ribs and a concussion… and made Cooper & Sons a household name. This was back in the early Eighties, before cable made local broadcasting a thing of the past. New York had its Crazy Eddie. LA had its Carl Worthington. And Chicago had Herb Cooper.
When I walked into Cooper & Sons Westside Auto Supply on Monday morning, my father was humping an ostrich. Someone had affixed a saddle to the ostrich’s back, and Herb, who was wearing a white cowboy outfit complete with tengallon hat, chaps and spurs, was attempting to mount it. The ostrich had other ideas. Herb grabbed the bird’s long neck and tried to throw one leg over it. The ostrich stepped lightly to its right, pivoted, and flipped Herb over its back. “Ow! Goddammit!” I fought back a wave of wooziness and silently counted to ten. I still struggled with the compulsion to damn things when people demanded it. If I hadn’t curtailed the practice at some point during the Civil War, the whole country would have been damned before the Battle of Bull Run. Chick Flaunt, Herb’s second in command and co-star, sprang out of the aisle between GPS Options and Satellite Radios. “Come on, Herbie! Get your bony butt up and tank that bird sonofabitch!” Flaunt, a smallish barrel of a man, was wearing his “Old Elvis” costume: white spandex unitard with sequined armpit wings, oversized sunglasses, elevator shoes and plasticene black pompadour. The shiny hairpiece sat slightly askew atop Flaunt’s actual hairpiece. As the camera crew dodged around them, Flaunt herded the ostrich toward Herb. Herb was on his hands and knees gasping for air. “Herbie! Heads up!” While long on personality, Herb was a deceptively small man. On a heavy day, after a weighty meal and a stroll through a pounding rainstorm, he topped the scale at a buck fifty. His balding pate shone through the thin spots in his dyed black hair, which he wore long, combed backward and slicked down to within an inch of its life. During his more frenetic commercials his hair would spring up around his head, the long comb-over bouncing furiously; a demented Cab Calloway
in cowboy chaps. In another life he might have been one of the godfathers of rock & roll; a contemporary of Chuck Berry or Fats Domino. In this life, he was the lunatic who wrestled live anacondas on late night cable access. “Herbie! We’re burnin’ daylight!” Herb hopped to his feet and advanced, lunged, grabbed again for the ostrich’s neck while trying to sling his leg over the saddle. The ostrich swung itself around, dragging Herb along, and whipped him across the room. Herb slammed into the vending machine and shattered the glass front, sprawling among the chocolaty treasures inside. Flaunt threw an improvised “lasso” (an orange outdoor extension cord from the service center) over the ostrich’s head. The ostrich chest butted him into the magazine rack. Issues of Autotrader flapped skyward. “Hey!” I shouted. “Guys, wait!” But both men leaped to their feet, Herb bleeding now from a shallow cut across his forehead. “Flank him, Chick!” “Yeah! Just like the ’Cong in the Ashau Valley! July 10th, 1969!” Herb circled around behind the ostrich, who was rooting through a bucket of Puppy Chow. Flaunt countered, ducking and weaving like the referee of a crackhead kickfight. “That’s right, Herbie Boy! I’ll get him on his blind side!” They’d reconnected at a Republican VietNam veteran’s reunion/gambling boat trip up the Mississippi River in 1982. After bonding over tales of their heroic exploits (which included dawn patrols in a Honolulu whorehouse), Herb invited Flaunt to help him run Cooper & Sons Automotive International LLC. They’d been best friends and conjoined pains in my posterior ever since. “Flank him, Herbie! Flank his black ass good!” Despite what some fundamentalists claim, I didn’t hate anyone. When you’ve seen the ugly scars that mar the
majority of mortal souls one is much the same as any other. But Chick Flaunt could rupture the patience of Job. My Old Testament Self would have gleefully burned him alive just to resurrect him and feed him to starving bears. “That’s it, Herbie! Now coldcock the bastard!” Sensing its imminent violation, the ostrich hissed and raised one massively muscled foot, its killing claws extended. A healthy adult male ostrich can weigh over two hundred pounds, run at thirty miles per hour, and gut a lion with one kick. Herb and Flaunt tensed for one final, mutually destructive pounce. “Stop!” Herb glared at me. Flaunt scowled, one oily lock of his Elvis pompadour dangling between his eyes. The ostrich glanced over at me, its deadly foot held at the ready. “You know these people?” “Yes. They’re harmless.” “I don’t believe you.” “You’re right. They’re idiots.” “I don’t have to put up with this. I’ve done television.” “Why don’t you take five?” I said. “I’ll smooth their feathers.” The ostrich – whose name was Sauwk – hissed a reluctant assent, and spread its wings in a threat posture intended mostly to intimidate. The big bird was exhausted. I sympathized: long experience with Herb and his passions could wear down the Rock of Gibraltar. I stroked his neck while silently appealing to his professionalism with compliments and offers of future employment. “Hey, Jacques Cousteau, why don’t you marry the bastard if you love it so much?” Do it. Reverse his digestive system. No one will notice. I untwisted the orange extension cord dangling from Sauwk’s neck and invited him to enjoy more Puppy Chow. Sauwk released six eggsized fecal pellets in Herb’s general direction and strutted back to his food bucket.
“What’d ya have to stick your nose in it for?” Flaunt sneered. “Herbie and me would’ve got the situation under control just fine without you, Mister Save the Whales.” “You know, Chick, if you’re trying to insult someone, pointing out their better qualities is pointless unless you’re trying to make them feel really great.” “Oooohhh, somebody flunked out of his fancy graduate school. Hey, Emily Post, how ’bout pitchin’ yerself into that saddle? Then Herb can ride you around for the commercial!” Flaunt laughed in the irritating way he did when he thought he’d scored a point. I reconsidered burning him alive just to make a bigger one. “We’re doing a new spot for the website,” Herb said. “That damn pelican has thrown us off schedule. We’re gonna have to do it tomorrow: I got meetings.” “Hey, Pop. Can I borrow some money?” “Jesus H The Christ,” Flaunt moaned. “Kids today, ingrates… every one of ’em. Hell I remember…” “Give him a break, Chick.” “Herbie this kid’s had more ‘breaks’ than a mirror with a million cracks. Back in the day…” “Chick…” “…my old man would’a kicked my ass harder than Chinese algebra. I mean if you ask me…” “I didn’t ask you, Chick!” Flaunt threw up his hands in a “why do I bother” flutter of exasperation, his Elvis pompadour flapping like a detached scalp. Then he turned on one elevated heel and stomped off to annoy the camera crew. Herb turned back to me, shaking his head. “I suppose I’ll be paying for that till Judgement Day. Why the hell do you need money?” (Herb could switch conversational gears faster than a newly-avowed lesbian at a Texas prolife rally.) “Don’t I pay you enough to mismanage this place?”
“I want to take Surabhi somewhere special Friday night. But I need a minor advance.” “Hey! You thinking about poppin’ the question, son?” “Well…” “You are, aren’t you? You’re gonna ask Sonoma–” “Her name is Surabhi for the seventy-eighth time this week. And there’s not going to be any wedding.” Herb’s face fell. “No wedding?” Herb loved the institution of marriage. That was the problem: he loved the institution more than the woman he married. He could also smell imminent weddings and pregnancies like a bloodhound on the hunt. “I see,” he sighed, laying a smallish hand on my elbow. “Step into my office, son. Time you and me talked mano to mano.” “I have to watch the front desk. The customers…” “What customers? We don’t open till ten.” “But...” “Come on.” We entered the Fortress of Gratitude: Herb believed that every employee who entered his office should do so with “An Attitude of Gratitude.” He’d even had the words inscribed on a little plaque on the wall behind his big mahogany desk; right between his autographed poster of Ronald Reagan and the life-sized standup of himself dressed as “Super Herb.” “Sit.” I sat in the small chair in front of his desk. Herb rifled through his drawers and came up with a wrapped sandwich. “You hungry?” “No thanks.” Two days after the fight with Zeus, the thought of food still made me slightly delirious. “You look like a damn scarecrow. You need to eat if you’re ever going to get your full growth.” Herb munched thoughtfully on his turkey and tomato wrapped in lettuce. He’d been on a low-carb diet for half a
decade. Because of long-term glycogen deprivation he was sometimes subject to erratic behavior. Sometimes, at night I would catch him waltzing with a box of Raisin Bran, crooning “I’m gonna eat you. Oh yes… I’m gonna… eeeat…” “Lando Cooper… I know who you really are.” “What?” “The jig is up, son. I’ve uncovered your big, cosmic secret.” He chuckled again, his eyes round with a kind of conspiratorial wonder. “God Almighty.” From my dimensionally sensitive multi-mind, several Aspects tossed up suggestions. Sky Daddy: “Rewrite his memory.” Father Flies: “Erase him from the spacetime continuum.” Burning Bush: “Give him a stroke, then if he recovers you can tell him it was all a hallucination.” “If you think I haven’t been paying attention, son… you’re wrong.” Herb reached up with one mayonnaise smeared finger and tapped his right temple. “These eyes don’t miss a trick. As a student of the Human Animal… I see all.” Herb arched his brows. “Look at me, Lando. Look me in the eye when I’m talking to you.” “I am looking at you.” “No you’re not.” “I am.” “Unflinchingly?” “You’re insane.” Herb stood. “Lando… a steady, unflinching gaze…” “‘…establishes interpersonal tactical dominance.’ I know, Pop.” “That’s Herb’s Rule of Engagement Numero Uno, son. First thing any effective negotiator learns… if he intends to make something of himself someday.” “I’m not interested, Pop.” “Lando, I know that you’re struggling with certain elements of your personality. And although I don’t claim to understand it...”
“Pop, I just want to borrow some cash.” “Son… you’re gay.” “Pop.” “It’s OK, Lando.” “I’m not gay.” “Well I think you are.” “I am not.” “Admit it now. Get it off your chest.” “No.” “Denial. That’s sad, boy.” “I’m not gay!” “Twenty-first century, son. Liberation done come to de plantation. I may not approve of your lifestyle, but I’ll die to support you. That’s why we all marched, back in the Sixties...” “Pop…” “…why my generation took to the streets while ‘Mister Charlie’ was burning school children and nightbombing churches…” “You’re ridiculous.” “I marched so that you and your brothers could be as irresponsible as the White Man’s children...” “I’m not doing this with you, Pop.” “…waste your lives in whatever meaningless pursuits you see fit, no matter how much it might break the hearts of those who sang freedom songs while Klansmen hounded us with dogs and torches.” “Torches? Were they chasing black people or Frankenstein’s monster?” Herb chuckled again. “Deflect and Distract: another useful negotiating strategy. When you take over the store…” “I’m not taking over the store, Pop.” “…when you take over from your ailing old man, you’ll have to be strong, son. Stronger than those early pioneers.” Herb reached into his pocket and produced a thickish wad
of cash from the billfold he’d had surgically grafted to his hip. He thumbed through the wad and peeled five one hundred dollar bills. “I want you to take Sabrina out Friday night. Show her a good time. Grab a hotel room in the Loop. Do the deed, for Christ’s sake. You’re not still a virgin are you?” “No! Not that it’s any of your business.” Herb held up his hand. “Just be sure to take your gal out for a ‘test drive’. Nobody wants you puttin’ your money down on the wrong horse. You know… genderwise. One thing about me and your mother… we were sexual dynamite.” “Awkward for me, but thanks for spoiling my appetite.” A glint of calculation ignited in Herb’s eyes. “So when are we gonna meet this ‘young lady’ of yours?” “Soon,” I said, relieved that I wouldn’t have to excise him from the spacetime continuum. “I gotta get back to work. Inventory today.” “Hmmm, yes. Interesting concept: inventory.” I reached over and grabbed for the money. Herb yanked his hand back. “Lando, you know if there’s ever anything you need to get off your chest, you can always come to me, right?” “I know.” “I’m much more open than your mother. God knows how we ever produced four healthy sons...” “Pop, please.” “Sorry. It’s just, living like we do… well things with Mom and Dad aren’t as rosy as they seem.” “Rosy’s not the word that springs to mind.” Herb smiled. But a flicker of sadness glimmered in his eyes. “True, son. Very true.” He extended the handful of bills toward me again. I reached for it, and he jerked his hand back once more as if he’d just snatched it out of a furnace.
“How about you mow the lawn Saturday morning?” “Pop...” “Come on now. I pay you for working here to show you the value of a buck, not to take the honeys out for a tour of Boy’s Town.” “On what you pay me, ‘Boy’s Town’ would have to be the size of a postage stamp.” “Hey, any time free room and board get too rough for your delicate sensibilities…” “Alright… I’ll mow the lawn.” “Front and back?” “Yes!” “And clean the mower blades?” “I could strangle you.” “Excellent. Nothing in life sweeter than a ‘twofer’, son. That’s…” “I know: ‘Twice the goods and/or services for half the price’.” “Damn right. Well? Get back to work.” I remembered my promise to intercede on Sauwk’s behalf. “Why an ostrich?” Herb shrugged. “The elephant was double booked.” “The ostrich won’t let you ride, Pop. He’s got arthritis.” “Really?” “Yup. Why not try letting Chick try to lasso it in the background while you riff in the foreground? That way you get to improvise, and the audience gets a twofer.” At the word “improvise” Herb’s face brightened. He was a frustrated actor who fancied himself a master of improvisation. If he hadn’t feared what he called “…an actor’s life, filled with uncertainty” he would have auditioned for Second City. That and his polite phobia of Jews kept him from pursuing a career in show business. “You’re right. Ostriches are funny without having to try.” “Alright.”
“And Chick and I can riff till the cows come home. People love it when we riff. That’ll help him pull his panties out of his ass.” Herb picked up the office phone and dialed Flaunt’s extension. As I headed for the door to the Fortress of Gratitude, he called out to my retreating back. “Have fun with Susanna, son. Loosen up a little.” “OK, Pop.” “And get a haircut. You look like a goddamn spear chucker.” I pocketed the money and hurried back to work.
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